Night of the Living Wed

Then she remembered the seemingly compromising position in which she had found her fiancé just minutes before, and Charlotte couldn’t help but ask, “John, who was that woman on the balcony?”

“What woman?” John kicked open a pair of swinging doors that led into a gallery, only to be greeted by delirious moans and groping arms. A fresh stew of zombies in fancy evening dress—guests of the ball—lurched toward them.

“Wrong door.” John grabbed her hand and they raced away from the approaching horde, taking a sharp turn into the kitchen. John grabbed a steel-legged bar stool and shoved it through the door handles, forming a sturdy barricade. “That should keep them back. For now.”

Charlotte wondered if her ribs could withstand the torture of her thudding heart as she looked around her. The deserted kitchen was beautiful in the moonlight, the stainless-steel appliances shimmering silver.

Their lives had been blessed up until now. Would it all end tonight?

A strange hissing noise alerted her.

Candelabra in hand and prepared to swing, Charlotte crept around the butcher-block counter. Hunched on the other side and clasping a rosary sat the priest whom Tina had introduced to her earlier. “Father!”

“Back!” The priest wielded his rosary cross as if it were a weapon.

“I’m not a zombie,” she said, kneeling before him. “Are you okay?”

John swung around the other side of the counter to join them, which startled the skittish priest once again. He swung the rosary like a lariat and clocked John on the eyelid.

“Ouch. Is that what I get for missing confession for the last five years?” John rubbed his bleeding brow.

“He’s not a zombie, either?” the trembling priest asked Charlotte.